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Real Means Real?

“Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina said that he had heard no discussion about removing Ms. Palin from the ticket. In fact, he said, he thought her daughter’s pregnancy would not hurt her with voters.

“People are looking for real,” he said in an interview. “Real means blemishes, real means warts, real means real. These family imperfections make people say, ‘That family isn’t so different from my family.’”

My own opinion is that this doesn’t matter at all: how they choose to deal with their underage daughter’s pregnancy is their business alone.

But the interesting angle to this story, at least to me, is the need to frame this story as an instance of Sarah Palin’s “realness.” In fact, this whole campaign has been framed recently in terms of how “real” candidates are: Michelle Obama took the stage at the first night of the DNC to talk about her family in order to assuage ordinary Americans (read: elderly white voters in key mid-western states) that the Obama family is “just like them;” John McCain was busted when he showed his wealth by blurting out that he doesn’t know how many houses he own; Joe Biden emphasized his Scranton, Pennsylvania roots to show that he’s “not a Washington insider” (the most boldfaced lie ever); now, it’s Sarah Palin’s turn to be “real.”

My question is: has none of these people or his/her respective staffers ever seen that episode of the Dave Chappelle show with a sketched called “When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong?”

This fucking obsession with “realness” has got to fucking stop man. Who gives a flying FUCK if these people ain’t “real?” It’s the fucking policy that matters. If my sole basis for voting is based on “realness” and how closely I identify with these two candidates, I wouldn’t even fucking vote. After all, what the fuck does a former ‘Nam POW and a biracial African American have in common with me?

For fuck’s sake, I am a goddamn Chinese immigrant; I don’t know what the fuck it’s like to be imprisoned as a POW, and I sure as hell don’t know what it’s like to be of mixed heritage. I mean, sure, you can always pick and choose biographical nuggets to make the story fit, but that kind of shit is just not logically rigorous: it is purely post hoc rationalization.

So stop with the “realness” shit. And also, as The Dude once said to Walter: Walter, what the FUCK does Vietnam have to do with ANYTHING?